Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Ballston on a Half Shell

—

by

James A. Bacon
in

It just seems like common sense: If you cram more offices and housing into a place, you’ll get more people, more traffic and more congestion. That’s the sentiment animinating the opposition to increased density in Tysons Corner.

But common sense isn’t always right. In an example of the kind of reporting we should see more of, the Washington Post illuminates the Tysons Corner debate in a Feb. 18 article by looking at the Rosslyn-Ballston Corridor in Arlington. The surge in development along the Corridor, which is served by METRO, has produced relatively little extra automobile traffic. Skeptics respond that Tysons is different from Arlington: Increasing density, even if the METRO is built, will not have the same impact.

True, Tysons is different. It may present special challenges. That just means they the County will have to work at it — just like Arlington did. The Rosslyn-Ballston Corridor did not just emerge like Venus on the half-shell. Arlington has worked tirelessly for decades to make its METRO Corridor work. Says the Post:

It took Arlington decades, they said, to draw up plans, win support from nearby residents and then attract the kind of development they were hoping for.

Winning local support was achieved, officials said, only after countless meetings and pledges that Arlington would stick to a “bull’s-eye” approach, limiting the tallest buildings to a quarter-mile radius from rail stations and not encroaching on neighborhoods. To keep up support over time, the county instituted parking limits and traffic-calming methods on nearby streets.

Employees and residents in the corridor are encouraged to stay out of their cars through parking limits, transit subsidies, a county bus system, bike paths and pedestrian-friendly street designs. The county has the advantage of having control over the design of its secondary streets, an authority that in most Virginia counties is held by the state.

“It’s not just one policy but a whole series of things,” said Dennis Leach, the county’s transportation chief. “This is not something you do overnight. Arlington’s been at this 30 years, and not everything’s perfect. We have a lot more to do.”

There are no simple solutions. There are no painless remedies. Devising functional land use patterns and transportation systems will take unstinting effort. But the end result is a system that does work. What we have now will never work, no matter how much money we dump into it.

(Hat tip to Nova MiddleMan for bringing this article to my attention.)

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9 responses to “Ballston on a Half Shell”

  1. Real Inconvenient Truth Avatar
    Real Inconvenient Truth

    Why does everyone ignore that I-66 was completed through Arlington at the same time?

    Those new freeway lanes absorb a huge percentage of the new traffic generated by the massive Rosslyn to Ballston redevelopment. Check out the reverse commute from those Rosslyn to Ballston residential high-rises to Tysons Corner. It is gridlocked.

    Why not add peak hour tolls on I-66 through Arlington to pay for more transportation infrastructure, including transit from those Arlington condos to Tysons?

  2. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Real Inconenient Truth raises a great point re tolls and inter-Beta-Community traffic.

    It is easy to love the R-B Corridor and it is far better than what is happening around most METRO stations BUT

    Alrlington County has a huge surplus of jobs over housing in both its Beta Communities Greater North Arlington (including the R-B Corridor) and Greater South Arlington (including Pentagon City and Crystal City).

    Back to the question of why there are not yet any Balanced (Alpha) Communities.

    EMR

  3. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    Arlington County has a long tradition of working with citizen groups. Fairfax County has a current tradition of ignoring its citizens. For example, neither the Tysons Corner Task Force nor the Transit Oriented Development Task Force has completed it work. Yet 8 members of the BoS were content to grant major rezoning to the Macerich Co. at Tysons Corner.

    That’s reason enough for citizens to oppose anything more at Tysons Corner. The process is a sham. Gerry Connolly has accepted significant campaign contributions from West Group and other major Tysons Corner landowners. Moreover, he works for one of them – SAIC.

    Substantively, Ballston has always had grid streets. Tysons Corner doesn’t. Tysons Corner will never have its streets in a grid pattern. It would be too expensive to tear down what’s there and replace it with a street grid. Ballston and Tysons are as much alike as walnuts and software. Opposing more development at Tysons Corner under these conditions is the only sensible thing to do.

  4. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    “Opposing more development at Tysons Corner under these conditions is the only sensible thing to do.”

    Across Virgnia – more and more – citizens feel like road-kill when it comes to public process on growth and development issues.

    I hope the LOBBY folks appreciate their handiwork.

  5. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    TMT – did you see this:

    “Fairfax – Some Fairfax County supervisors say they’ve been singled out by a recent bill mandating more stringent disclosure requirements in land-use cases. The legislation comes amid an ongoing quarrel between the board and General Assembly.”

    http://www.examiner.com/a-585852~Supervisors_question_why_Assembly_singled_out_Fairfax_County.html

  6. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    TMT:

    “Substantively, Ballston has always had grid streets. Tysons Corner doesn’t.”

    TYSONS CORNER COULD EASILY HAVE A GRID OF PEDESTRIAN WAYS CONNECTING THE LAND USES TO METRO AND EACH OTHER.

    “Tysons Corner will never have its streets in a grid pattern.”

    TYSONS CORNER WILL ALWAYS BE CHAOS UNLESS RELIANCE ON AUTONOMOBILES TO GET AROUND IS COUNTERPRODUCTIVE.

    “It would be too expensive to tear down what’s there and replace it with a street grid.”

    IT YOU THINK OF ONLY ONE PLANE THAT IS TRUE. THINK THREE OF FOUR INTERCONNECTED LEVELS WITH EITHER UNDERGROUND OR ELEVATED METRO. SEE TORONTO, MONTREAL, ETC.

    “Ballston and Tysons are as much alike as walnuts and software.”

    ONE ENCOUNTERS A LOT OF NUTS IN THE SOFTWARE BUZ.

    “Opposing more development at Tysons Corner under these conditions is the only sensible thing to do.”

    THAT IS TRUE UNTIL THERE IS SOME INNOVATION IN THE THINKING ABOUT THE SHAPE OF FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE.

    The biggest problem with Tysons Corner is that there is too much development to serve with Autonomobiles and too much vacant and underutilized land to support a shared-vehicle system, even METRO.

    EMR

  7. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Sorry:

    The above sentence should have read:

    TYSONS CORNER WILL ALWAYS BE CHAOS UNLESS RELIANCE ON AUTONOMOBILES IS REPLACED WITH PEDESTRIAN AND SHARED-VEHICLE MOVEMENT. MAKING IT EASIER TO GET AROUND IN AN AUTONOMOBILE IS COUNTERPRODUCTIVE.

    EMR

  8. Toomanytaxes Avatar
    Toomanytaxes

    EMR – I agree with your concept for Tysons Corner. However, I contend that it not doable. The land is too expensive for builders to construct anything but more density. But once a building exceeds three or four stories, the construction costs skyrocket – or so I’ve been told. The result of density is very expensive condos or what have you. The average person simply cannot afford to live at Tysons Corner.

    Add to that the real desire of most people not to live in a condo, people will still need to commute to Tysons. The lastest paper from the FTA predicts that, in 2030, the Silver Line will add an additional 18,4000 passengers. Everyone else will drive.

    I’m back to where I was earlier, I need to see proof of concept. Tysons is terrible today and adding density would make it worse.

  9. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    TMT

    If todays news is any indication we may have run out of time to save the economy and in that case you are right. More on that in a post soon.

    “Add to that the real desire of most people not to live in a condo, people will still need to commute to Tysons.”

    THIS SENTENCE HIGHLIGHTS THE PROBLEM MOST HAVE WITH UNDERSTANDING HOW TO OVERCOME THE GAP BETWEEN THE “SWEET SPOT” FOR PRIVATE-VEHICLE MOBILITY AND FOR SHARED-VEHICLE MOBILITY.

    “SWEET SPOT” IN JIM W’s TERM FOR THE BOTTOM OF THE “U” SHAPED CURVE REPRESENTING THE TOTAL COST OF THESE TO ALTERNATIVE MOBIITY SYSTEMS. SEE THE COST OF SERVICE CURVE LAW.

    THE FRIST PHRASE IS RIGHT. OVER 50 PERCENT (MOST) DO NOT WANT TO LIVE IN A CONDO. (BUT SEE THE HOUSING VALUE NUMBERS FOR RESTON, IT IS THE MOST AFFODABLE PLACE IN THE COUNTY DUE TO THE HOUSING MIX INSPITE HAVING SOME OF THE MOST EXPENSIVE SAME HOUSE, SAME BUILDER COMPARISONS IN THE NORTHERN PART OF VA).

    WHILE MOST DO NOT WANT TO LIVE IN A CONDO, SOME CAN ONLY AFFORD THAT AND MANY WOULD BE VERY HAPPY IN A WELL DESIGENED AND WELL LOCATED NON-SINGLE FAMILY DETACHED THAT IS NOT A CONDO.

    THAT IS ESPECIALLY TRUE IF THEY HAVE TO PAY THE FULL LOCATION-VARIABLE COSTS OF THEIR DECISIONS.

    THE SECOND PART OF THE SENTENCE ABOUT COMMUTING REFLECTS A MISUNDERSTANDS THE ROLE OF SHARED-VEHICLE SYSTEMS IN AGGOMERATING HUMAN SETTLEMENTS AND THE ROLE OF NON-VEHICLE TRIPS.

    “The lastest paper from the FTA predicts that, in 2030, the Silver Line will add an additional 18,4000 passengers.”

    CHECK OUT “TIME TO FUNDAMENTALLY RETHINK METRO.” “TRANSIT CONSULTANTS” ARE SOME OF THE BIGGEST SUPPORTERS OF AUTONOMOBILITY. THEY THINK IN TERMS OF TRANSPORT FACILITIES AND NOT HUMAN SETTLEMENT PATTERN.

    “Everyone else will drive.”

    IF THEY DO THEY WILL BE DUMBER THAN THOSE WHO LIVE IN PLACES THAT ARE SIMILAR TO WHAT TYSONS CORNER WOULD BE.

    IF THEY DO IN FACT THERE WILL BE GRIDLOCK SQUARED AS YOU SUGGEST.

    As I tell my small parcel farmer friends. Try not to predict what citizens will do by what you like or assume they will make the same decisions you did when you had no choice.

    EMR

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